Indian Yog & American Yoga

In the familiar and unshakable Indian narrative, the discipline and practice of Yoga is uniquely Indian and origin, started by Lord Shiva and spread to the other part of the world by seven rishis (saints).

Indian yog & American yog

Shiva passed this transcendental knowledge to those seven rishis, 20,000 ybp. That time writing was not introduced. So knowledge was passed to disciple in oral version. Tomorrow disciple will become master and will pass the knowledge to his students orally.

So Yoga was practiced by rishis only for millennium , this knowledge was not preached to general public before the rishi Patanjali came into existence.  Rishi Patanjali decided to write the book on Yoga. So rishi Patanjali was the writer of Yoga book not the developer or founder. The founder of Yoga is Shiva. He was the first astronomer of the world who studied the seven celestial objects of space. Sun, moon and other five planets. That is why he passed the knowledge of transcendental yoga and space science to only seven Rishis.

In 20th century gurus and Swamis like Vivekananda and Paramhansa Yoganand carried this science to restless west. where a marketing machine sexed it up. Thus was born the American Yoga industry, replete with hot yoga, cold yoga, yoga plus, yoga lite etc.

Most of the asanas mentioned in India's ancient texts are seated or supine. There is a huge gap in the understanding of Hatha yoga, the physical manifestation of yogic practices, developed from what was originally and largely a spiritual discipline. It was only the modern era going back to the legendary Krishnamacharcya and BKS Iyenger: that many of the more physical asanas were fine tuned up.

Indira devi (died in 2002) , was first western ambassador of Yoga. She was born in Riga(now in Latvia) as Eugenie V Peterson. She started working in silent Bollywood movies. She worked in Arabian nights (opposite Prithvi raj kapoor)Later she moved to Mysore to learn yoga from a Guru.

Guru Krishnamacharya taught her Yoga. Then by the order of her guru she started spreading yoga in other parts of the world.  First she went to Sanghai.

By this time, Mysore king had already funded the trip of Swami Vivekanand to the US.

He introduced Raj yoga in the west, the highest spiritual form of Yoga. But Hatha Yoga was still a work in progress, and it is Indira Devi who brings it to the USA. Indra Devi makes her way to Hollywood. Among her early students : Greta Garbo and Gloria Swanson.


The reason why Yoga is so famous in America is because it is effective and it works. Although American yoga has developed because of ongoing cultural dialogue between East and West.

Indian Yoga was a Spiritual journey. It was about finding yourself through balancing body and mind. But American yoga is all about physical exercises, yes definitely getting health benefits but spiritual connection is missing.